DISPENSING
WITH THE usual typed-up formalities, Sarah
Cain has written the names of her paintings directly on the gallery
wall, on the right-hand side as you walk in. There's a P.S. at the end:
"Sarah Cain needs a home, this side of the bay or that...LOW OR NO RENT,
no joke," and her e-mail address. It's a bold plea, but it's also a
bit childish – not just the idea of scribbling on the wall, but also
the implicit denial of "all of the loonies out there" – to place such
seemingly naive trust in the public. It's a dichotomy that runs through
the rest of Cain's work, as well. Her paintings are deceptively simple;
their big, basic shapes and the sloppy drips in her rainbow painting
are perhaps intended as a warning that we shouldn't read too much into
them, although the carefully considered wordage on the wall reveals
how much thought the artist has invested in her work, and her fragile
hope that we'll linger and look for meaning in everything, even the
parts of the exhibit that seem most hastily assembled. In a sense, she
is a "painter's painter," with every brush stroke well planned and fretted
over. But she's also clearly interested in playing with the division
between painting and other, more three-dimensional endeavors, like sculpture
and architecture. With their simple shapes and pencil-sketch lines,
her works on paper utilize the barest of cues to make us imagine depth.
Elsewhere in the gallery, Cain has painted in the concave corners where
two walls meet the floor, effectively transforming an open-ended architectural
space into something finite, with perimeter lines and a well-defined
interior. Not only do her created spaces allow us to walk inside and
inhabit them, they also provide a (subconsciously?) symbolic projection
of her search for a place to call home. Fri.-Sun., 1-5 p.m., and by
appointment, 6608 San Pablo, Oakl. (510) 484-4373. (Lindsey Westbrook)